My thoughts on 'UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS' by Portia De Rossi

Unbearable Lightness: A Story of Loss and Gain by Portia de Rossi

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Wow! What a touching and honest memoir.

Of course I knew/know who Ellen DeGeneres is and I have heard of Portia De Rossi-even that the two of them were together, but I never really 'knew' Portia. Couldn't even remember what she looked like and of course knew nothing about her life.

So the first time I learned anything about her was when I was watching clips of Ellen's show on You Tube and Portia was on there as a guest. First thing I noticed was how pretty she was, then the love between her and Ellen was beautiful! Just from those few moments everyone could see that. After that I learned that Portia had an eating disorder (used to have) and that she had written a book about it. Now I definitely had to read that. This woman intrigued me-rather, her and Ellen intrigued me, but I still wanted to hear her story. So I got the book from my library....and...

This book is so intense, raw, real, honest, heartbreaking, and heart-lifting. I think it had more of an impact on me because Portia actually wrote this herself. These were all her actual words. She did not hire a ghost writer to put her story together.

She talks about her life trying to fit in and trying to be someone that, her mom especially, will be proud of. From the age of 12, Portia began modeling and thus truly began her affair with food and her weight.

I learned so much from this book. Eating disorders are not simple cut and dried things. They are so complex and there are so many other aspects involved. They are not just about wanting to be thin. They are about wanting to be in control of something in your life, about acceptance, insecurities, fear, etc. And even though I knew a lot of that, Portia wrote this story in a way that I felt it along with her.

The things that she did and the reactions from people that she encountered in her life were sometimes surprising but a lot of the times not. What surprised me even more was Portia's reactions to people when they shown concern to/about her. And once again, she made me understand why she reacted that way.

The second part of this book is when it really started to get intense and the epilogue made me cry.

I am so sorry that Portia went through everything that she went through. But I am so happy that she is know better and happy! And that Ellen is there for her. There love is extrraordinary!

Which brings me to the part of Portia's sexuality. Even though she felt she had to hide her sexuality because of her career, and unfortunately at that time she probably did, this book mostly focused on her eating disorder. She does address her sexuality in this book and about her fear of opening, but I felt it took a back seat to the disorder.

I recommend this book to everyone.



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My thoughts on 'FURY' by Elizabeth Miles

Fury by Elizabeth Miles

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


When I first started this book I wasn't sure I was going to like it because I really didn't like the MC, Em. She was a horrible bestfriend!

But as I kept reading I didn't let that bother me too much and just focused on the other aspects of the story.

This story is basically about revenge, karma, what goes around comes around. And I really liked the way Elizabeth goes about doing this.

Our MC, Em betrays her best friend in such a horrible way and thinks about nobody but herself. Because of this she is targeted, but things really don't start to happen to hear until near the end of the book.

Chase is the other character in the book who is also targeted, but you don't find out why he is targeted until towards the end of the book, when stuff starts happening to Em.

I like how Elizabeth draws everything else and how it is not just all thrown at us, but I wish that one of the characters Drea, had a bigger part. She was hinted at throughout the story, but when she was actually given her part I was disappointed by the lack of 'shock' value for her that you would think she should have had.

I was also disappointed by the explanation for what is happening to Em and Chase. I feel there should have been more of a background story to what was going on.

I did like the punishments that Em and Chase got though. They were very fitting to what they had done. (although I never would wish that on anyone, but this is just a book after all....lol)

There is a lot of bullying in this book tho and it was sad how common and harsh it seemed to be in this town/school.

In the end I am glad that I kept with the book and finished it.



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Announcing Johanthan L. Howard!

Strange Chemistry has signed on another author-Johnathan L. Howard!

Johnathan L. Howard has written a futuristic Science Fiction novel titled: KATYA'S WORLD.

The distant and unloved colony world of Russalka has no land, only the raging sea. No clear skies, only the endless storm clouds. Beneath the waves, the people live in pressurised environments and take what they need from the boundless ocean. It is a hard life, but it is theirs and they fought a war against Earth to protect it. But wars leave wounds that never quite heal, and secrets that never quite lie silent.

Katya Kuriakova doesn’t care much about ancient history. She is making her first submarine voyage as an apprentice navigator; the first nice, simple journey of what she expects to be a nice, simple career. But there is nothing nice and simple about the deep, black waters of Russalka and soon she will encounter pirates and war criminals, see death and tragedy at first hand, and realise that her world’s future lies on the narrowest of knife edges.

For in the crushing depths lies a sleeping monster, an abomination of unknown origin. And when it wakes, it will seek out and kill every single person on the planet…

This sounds very good and will be released in November 2012. So the line up for releases this year at Strange Chemistry is:

September: SHIFT and BLACKWOOD

October: POLTERGEEKS and THE ASSASSIN'S CURSE

November: KATYA'S WORLD

I hope you will check out these books!

My thoughts on 'DELIRIUM' by Lauren Oliver

Delirium by Lauren Oliver

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


This was such an amazing book! I loved everything about it from the very first page.

It is a dystopian book where love is a disease. How original and interesting! I couldn't help but agree with a lot of the story.

Love is truly a big problem in this world today. Or maybe not 'love' in particular, but strong feelings that are usually associated with love or with what some people may think is love. Feelings such as jealousy, revenge, anger, hurt, etc.

The cure which is supposed to 'cure' you from the disease or prevent you from getting the disease is basically like a less severe type of lobotomy. After you get this you are so easy going and so agreeable with everything.

You do not get this 'cure' until you are 18. A few months prior to this you go through an evaluation where you are basically judged/tested and then it is determined if you are able to go on to college or not. You are also give 4 people of the opposite sex to pick one from for your mate for life. Yes, you are also told basically who you are going to spend the rest the rest of your life with.

I liked that God was still present during this time. Maybe not in exactly the way we see Him, but he is still there and I really liked that.

The MC, Lena, at the beginning is so excited about the procedure (the cure) that she studies for the evaluation to make sure that she says the right things and she actually is counting down the days until she gets the cure.

Her best friend, Hana, actually rebels a little a few months before they are scheduled for the procedure and she tries to get Lena to rebel with her, but Lena wants no part of it, especially because if you are caught (and there are a lot of rules, such as not being with the opposite sex who haven't had the cure yet...not listening to approved music, etc) it can mean being put in the Crypts (jail) or worse.

Lena does everything that she is supposed to do, everything that is expected of her, wether she wants to or not. That is until she meets Alex.

Alex and her meet by accident and things kind of take of from that accidental meeting. They snowball, if you will, and before you know if Lena is so wrapped up in Alex that she can't think of anything else. She definitely has the 'disease'. She is in love!

She sneaks around every day and night just to be with Alex. Although she knows that they won't be together forever because her procedure is coming up, she refuses to think about that. Until the day that Lena finds out some devastating, or great news. Depending on how you look at it. What Lena finds out changes everything and next thing you know she is planning on running away with Alex. But running away is a huge and dangerous thing.

Of course things do not go as planned, but Lena and Alex seem to have overcome those obstacles, only to encounter more right at the end of the book. And of course the book ends on a huge cliffhanger!

I cannot wait to read the next book! Highly recommend this book!



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STRANGE CHEMISTRY OPEN DOOR!!

This is really exciting! When I got the email I knew I had to blog about it...

Strange Chemistry-in conjunction with Angry Robot Books- is doing an open door from April 16th to April 30th. What this means is that UNAGENTED AUTHORS are invited to send in their novels for consideration.

They say they will read everything they are sent, but please go to their website to find out everything you need to do before you mail out your manuscript.

My thoughts on 'FRACTURE' by Megan Miranda

Fracture by Megan Miranda

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


"If you had one day left to live, what would you do?"

This was such a good story with excellent writing and great characters!

The story is about a teenager named, DeLaney, who falls through a frozen lake and dies. But yet, she doesn't. She comes back and ends up in a coma for 6 days, where upon coming out of that coma, she is changed.

Not in the obvious ways that you would think, but in ways that you would never think. DeLaney ends up having some strange gift or curse, depending on the way that you look at it. This 'thing' that she has acquired changes her life so much and in so many ways.

She meets a strange new boy who she is both attracted to and repulsed by, her relationship between her neighbor and best friend becomes strained and the way her mom looks at her also changes, and not for the better.

DeLaney is trying to figure out what is going on with her and there is only person who seems to know, or at least who is experiencing the same thing she is. The one person she would rather stay away from. She is afraid to open up to other people about this for fear of what they will think or say. So she is stuck trying to deal with it all by herself. Or almost by herself.

But underneath the obvious, are also the feelings she is having for two different boys and she is not sure how to deal with them.

This story just flowed for me and the first chapter literally made me cry. It takes a lot to make me cry but this author did such a great job with her words that I just welled up.

A great debut novel that I highly recommend!

Check out the trailer....



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My thoughts on 'LIVING VIOLET' by Jaime Reed

Living Violet by Jaime Reed

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I read this book immediately after reading The Goddess Test and there were many things that were similar to me.



This is a story about a girl named Sam who works in a bookstore with a girl named Nadine. Also working at the bookstore is a boy named Caleb, who Sam thinks is weird but yet, she finds him intriguing-especially because of his violet eyes.



One day Sam and Caleb have a small chat at work and out of nowhere Caleb kisses her. And this begins their 'hot and cold' relationship.



There are some women around town that have been either dying or hospitalized because of heart attacks and then there is Caleb, whom Sam thinks is acting strange.



Sam soon learns some secrets about Caleb and her friend Nadine and after that nothing is the same for her.



There is intrigue, mystery, who-dun-it and of course romance in this book also. The same elements that were in The Goddess Test.



I thought that the story was well written and the characters were well done, but the whole 'thing' that was going on, the paranormal aspect, I wasn't too excited about. It was very interesting, but I don't know. It was just missing something for me.



I do want to add that there is a lot of pop culture in this book and the dialogue has a decent amount of slang in it. I actually found it more appealing to me, but years down the road I am not sure how that will affect the story.



Not a bad book and I am sure it will end up being a favorite of many people this year.



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